I’m trying not to be overly dramatic here, but as soon as I heard that an AI had been used to clone Adobe’s biggest software hits, my first thought was: It’s finally happened. That’s not to say I’m jumping for joy; rather, I’ve been wondering when AI would become a direct threat to a large company. And they don’t come much bigger than Adobe. But before I explain why that matters, let’s delve into the unfolding situation.
What’s happened?
Tech news outlet Ars Technica released an article entitled: “Software is over: Bold AI developer takes aim at Adobe with open source clones”. It turns out that small AI developer Artcraft has used Anthropic’s Claude to build a series of open-source applications based on Adobe’s biggest hitters: Photoshop, Lightroom, Premiere, After Effects, Illustrator, InDesign, and Acrobat Pro.
To be clear, these aren’t like-for-like replications. Each software has its own name, such as PhotoCraft, LightCraft, FilmCraft, etc. But as can be seen on the company’s website, the interfaces of each software are very familiar. So much so that in the YouTube video (above) by AI Samson, he says when comparing both Photoshop and PhotoCraft’s user interfaces: “They are so similar that you’re able to move from one tool to another with zero learning curve.”
Before we get too excited, these free-to-downoad open-source applications are said to be far from perfect in their current state. And yet, Artcraft is bullish in its commitment to refine its offering. In replying to a post in which the announcement was made on Reddit, the developer who goes by the name of ai_art_is_art, replied to a comment stating: “We have a really long way to go to get to complete parity on functionality and file format support, but that's 100% our goal”.
What does this mean for the industry?
So, back to my original point. The reason I find this situation fascinating is that it’s AI directly impacting a giant company. Don’t get me wrong, competition is nothing new for Adobe. In recent years, a plethora of releases, including a free model for Canva's Affinity, have only made things harder.
But when you consider the size of the software titan, its thousands of employees, years of refinement, and billions of dollars spent, the fact that anything remotely close to its Creative Cloud suite is even possible this quickly and with comparatively minuscule investment and personnel will surely be concerning to both Adobe's board and investors – not to mention its legal team!
Don't get me wrong, editing software companies have been riffing off of Adobe for decades. There's a reason why Creative Cloud is still, in many cases, the industry standard. It's not just about the look and feel of the software; it's the quality of the end product. I've not used any of the aforementioned ArtCraft software, but replicating a user experience is one thing; replicating the performance and the quality of the output is another thing altogether.
And yet it poses a question I’ve been thinking about for a long time. Adobe aside, it’s all well and good for all these huge companies to invest in the so-called AI boom, but what happens if/when AI comes for them, too?
Is the AI wolf knocking at the door?
As a creative, my biggest worries about genAI have historically been questions over the pilfering of copyrighted work, the erosion of creative autonomy, and the threat cheap AI alternatives pose to working creatives. That’s why I’ve long believed more stringent measures are required and boundaries enforced. But these are problems that have largely threatened smaller companies and working individuals.
And while Adobe does seem to get a lot of hate online, it has at least tried to walk some kind of tightrope between embracing AI and its commitment to the creative industry, with examples including its commercially safe Firefly models and Content Credentials.
But Artcraft’s software suite is direct competition for Adobe, and it’s appeared largely out of nowhere. If it works, what’s to stop others from cloning and undercutting other pieces of software? At the very least, this must have put the entire digital economy on notice. It sure feels like a boundary has been broken and the AI cat is out of the bag.
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